After Mom and Dad sent us this silly little video, we thought we'd give it a try. Since Laina was on my lap the whole time, she got in twice. :)

Soul Train Twinnies

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The Originals

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Laina and her big Bro.

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Guess who got themselves ready for church without any help from Mama? I put him in the bath and the next thing I knew he was dressed and had his hair gelled to perfection.
He then insisted on a mini photo-shoot for the blog. Is it weird that my kids use the word 'blog' in everyday conversation?

I insisted on one non-pose for g-ma. (It's the only way I can get him to stop and smile)

I can't remember if I put Austin with his faux-hawk up. He demanded on after I refused to cut off his curls for the real thing. After about 10 minutes all he had left was a superman curl in the middle of his forehead.

I painted my toenails for the first time since Lora's wedding. Alaina begged to have 'matchy-match' fingernails...so I gave in. (I have no will power.) Here she is showing off her new gorgeous nails.

When I was taking her picture I looked down and couldn't believe how grown up her little hand was. Sometimes I want to document every little detail of my sweet babies before they completely grow up. Every part of them is just so perfect and sweet and beautiful and alive. I hate to see them change so quickly but I love every new adventure. If I could hold on to these moments now when they are so individual and independent and yet they will spontaneously smother you with kisses, hugs and i-love-yous, I would. At least, I'd stretch it out a few extra years. Like 20.

Some more silly things that my kiddies say....

Apparently marriage has been on my kiddies' minds. Here are a few quotes from dinner.

ethan "Molly was line-leader today and she told me she likes me. Actually she loves me. Actually she wants to marry me." All marriages need a healthy dose of confidence.

austin. "You notice what Mama? Sophia likes Bolt. And I like Bolt! So, I'm going to marry Sophia." A good marriage is built on like interests.

alaina. "I like Sophia too. I'm going to marry her too!" me-"You need to marry a boy, otherwise, who is going to be the Daddy?" Laina- "Actually Mama, you don't need to have a Daddy to have a family. There are lots of families without a Daddy." me- "oh. uh. yeah. That's right, but it would be preferable to have a Daddy. You'll want to marry your best friend." Laina- "oh. ok. Then I want to marry Austin." me- "yeah. uh. That's not going to work either." Fortunately, we've got some time to work on Alaina. She knows she's not allowed to get married until she's 30.

Once Ethan gets an idea into his head, his tunnel vision sets in and that is all he talks about. Three days ago I noticed that his shoelaces were shredded, making it difficult to tie them. I mentioned that it might be a good idea to get new ones. That afternoon when he got home from school he asked if I had gotten new shoelaces yet. I hadn't. The next morning he told me to get some shoelaces while he was at school. Again, I was too busy to bother. The moment he got off the bus, he started in with the questions. Did I get the shoelaces. "No." Why not? "I was pretty busy and forgot. He then looked at me and said, "I really need new shoelaces. Don't forget again. Mama. Do you need me to write this down?" Hows that for a dressing down from a 6 year old? This morning (after another verbal reminder) I managed to get the laces. Three different sizes, just in case.

austin..."it's so hot, I'm sweltering."

alaina, "hey, I real--lize where we are. I real--lize that big M. (passing the golden arches) Do you real--lize it mama?" (recognize)

Austin always says, do you notice what? instead of you know what. "You notice what I did this morning?"

8 days of school under his belt and as my sweet Ethan came off the bus he shouted out "I QUIT 1st Grade!!!!!" It's going to be a long 11 years.

Ethan got home from school and blurted out, "you wanna hear something gross? yesterday I was going pee and I forgot to hold onto my name (badge) and it fell into the potty!" "ew. that IS really gross. Did you wash it off." "Yeah...I wiped it off on my shirt." "And?" "and then I put it back on!"

Coming off the bus Alaina was upset. Ethan was yelling, "yes. I squished Alaina!" Alaina cried, "I didn't want to be squished." Ethan, with authority, replied, "Listen. I'm the big brother. I have to squish you. I have to take care of you and that means squishing you." Heaven help us.

Happy Birthday to me! I'm 35 this year. Ethan came home from school saying, "My friend told me that Daddies always have to be older than Mommies but I told everyone that isn't true. I told them that MY Mommy was really really old. Really older than my Dad. Right Mom?" Uh. Gee. Thanks kid. But I'm feeling pretty good at 35, so I'm not too worried. (especially since when I was putting Ethan to bed he secretly whispered that he thought Daddy was pretty old too because "his hair is all stringy right about here" as he touched his forehead. I'm thinking "stringy" meant "thin") But really, I'm healthy and happy. I've got some pretty awesome kids and a wonderful hubby. I'm thinking that 35 is going to be a terrific year.

Robert was, sadly, out of town this weekend but Nathan was in town for business. Lucky me. I just switched one Jones out for another. :) I even got flowers! (Thanks for the loaner, Lindi :) The kids adored Nathan from the moment he walked in the door. Every sentence was "Uncle Nathan...look at this." "Uncle Nathan....guess what I did at school." Since we live so far away from all of their Uncles and Aunties, they haven't had much of a chance to get to know many of them. As it was, they were all over each other trying to get Nathan's attention.
I made this really yummy pie (cream cheese, cool whip, pudding, raspberries, blueberries & Nilla wafers.) but Austin had expressed concern over the cake,"Daddy isn't here and we don't know how to make the cake...what will we put our candles in?" So I decided to go all out and make the cake too. It turned out really fun and tasty. I put a fudge, coconut, heath bar layer in the middle and used a marshmallow fondant. The pictures we took that night didn't do it justice so I took a few more this afternoon. The second set of pictures really show the colors better but there is only half a cake left.

By the end of the night the kids had gorged themselves with sugar. It wasn't a pretty sight. Seriously. We're looking at a repeat tonight, I'm sure.

Ah. Myrtle Beach. What's not to love? The sand. The sun. The water. But I think the biggest draw that got us there this last weekend was the fact I wouldn't have to clean the hotel room. That's right. I was cracking under the pressure of getting the house spotless for possible showings every day. So we decided to make a run for it.
Thanks to hotwire we had a very cheap hotel room on the beach. I'm sure there are many really fun things to do in Myrtle Beach but we pretty much stayed on the beach the whole time. We did get suckered into a Planet Hollywood which provided terrible food for an extremely outrageous price.
The kids really loved jumping into the ocean this year. Last year they all were a little scared of the water and wouldn't let go of our hands. This trip I could hardly make them stay close by. Ethan really took off with the boogie boarding. He loved catching the waves and probably would never had stopped if he wasn't using the only boogie board that we had. Alaina was also crazy about the boogie board. She pretty much floated on top of the board when she wanted to catch a wave. Austin wasn't loving the board so much but he did keep on trying to dive into the waves. That mostly consisted of him bending his knees and hitting the wave face on.

We fed the kids nothing but terrible food. Sugar cereals & fudge bars, baby. The fudge bars would have been a better idea if the mini freezer worked. Instead we ended up having to shove them down the kids as fast as possible before they all melted. The kids thought it was Christmas.